Since such portable telephones as cellular phones, personal handy phones (referred as to “PHS” later) and so on generally have a memory dial function for which the telephone numbers of partners are previously set and stored in the telephones, many users can manage the telephone numbers of the partners using the memory dial function without memorizing the telephone numbers in another memory.
Thus, if the data such as the telephone numbers of the partners happen to be not able to be utilized because of a loss or a failure of the portable telephones or because of a loss of the data due to external causes such as erroneous operation, shocks and so on, the users would suffer great disadvantages.
In addition to the case that the data cannot be utilized, in case that the old portable telephone is replaced by a new portable telephone, it will take much time for the user itself to input the same data as stored in the old telephone into the new telephone. Furthermore, if the data such as the telephone numbers stored in one telephone might be utilized in another telephone, a convenience of the telephones would increase.
In consideration of the aforementioned points, there have been proposed many arts in which the data such as the telephone numbers stored in the portable telephones are stored into external storages such as memory cards. These arts are disclosed in JP55-128955, JP58-58669, JP60-49463, JP61-20464, JP61-43050, JP64-22153, JP2-172355, JP4-302245, JP5-145476, JP9-64959, JP10-32631, JP11-74962 and JU62-112241.
Furthermore, there have been proposed many other arts in which the data such as the telephone numbers are delivered and received through an external information instrument connection terminal of the portable telephone to and from a general information processing equipment called as a mobile gear or a personal computer without using any equipment peculiarly prepared for storing the telephone numbers. These arts are disclosed in JP5-56131, JP5-292172, JP6-46120, JP6-90309, JP6-244986, JP7-111525 and JP8-6902, for example.
However, these prior arts should disadvantageously prepare the equipment peculiarly used for the external storage of the data, but never used in a condition of normally using the portable telephones. Some arts require a special interface or construction for connection of the external storage provided on the side of the telephones. This disadvantageously tends to prevent the arts from being applied to the existing telephones.
There has been proposed an art in which abbreviating dial information is stored in an external storage prepared in a telephone operation station or an exclusive operator without preparing it on the side of the user of the telephone so that other portable telephones can commonly use the abbreviating dial information. This art is disclosed in JP8-307944.
However, since any of the prior arts including the art in which the external storage is provided in the telephone operation station or the like requires the operation which the users themselves memorize such data as the telephone numbers and so on in the external storage, back up them or make an instruction therefor, the operation is much troublesome.
As the result, there occurs a problem in which the data such as the telephone numbers and so on cannot be possibly restored later when the data are erroneously lost because the users don't or forget to back up the data. This is a big trouble in taking into consideration that the backup data are suddenly required in many cases.
This similarly arises in the art in which the data are backed up in the external storage while using the connection terminals for the external information instrument which the portable telephones generally have without providing any interface in those telephones.
There has been provided an art in which the data stored in volatile memories such as RAM, SRAM and so on which are operated in association with the power supply are memorized in the portable telephones as a charger including an external storage rather than the external storage together with the charging operation. This is disclosed in JP5-55979.
This also has occurred such a problem that if the data to be re-memorized in the portable telephones are previously neither stored nor backed up in the external storage, the data cannot be prevented from being lost because the data stored in the peculiarly prepared external storage is just re-memorized together with the charging operation and because the data cannot be stored unless the RAM gets the state of being able to be operated by its energization and therefore the data are just re-memorized after the RAM gets the state of being able to be operated together with the charging operation or after being charged and in addition thereto, the external storage should be provided separately from the portable telephones in preparation for consumption of the battery and brought together with the portable telephones and if otherwise, the data cannot be restored, which causes the troublesome operation to be required.
There has been proposed a charger into which an external storage such as a memory card or the like can be installed as disclosed in JU 4-110034. However, this can only keep the telephone therein, charge it and make the operation to the memory card by using a single equipment and cannot prevent the data from being lost and also requires a special interface, which means that it has the same problems as the other prior arts.
Since any of the aforementioned prior arts have the object of only backing up the data such as the telephone numbers of the parties for operating the telephones to the particular parties, this cannot be coped with when the telephone break down in such a manner as the control information required for the operation of the portable telephones such as the programs peculiar to the telephones required to get the waiting-for state of arrival and dispatch of the telephones is lost by any cause.
In addition thereto, in any of the prior arts, since the setup functions in which the users themselves set personal identification numbers, adjust the arrival sound of the telephones and so on cannot be backed up, the information on these setup functions other than the telephone numbers has to be reinput by the users themselves when the old telephones are replaced by the telephones newly bought, for example, which produces a problem of making the operations troublesome.
The object of the invention is to provide a data backup equipment for a portable telephone and a method of backing up data by using the equipment adapted to be able of being applied to the existing telephones, to prevent the data from being lost without any operation of intentionally backing up the date so that the data can be used as they are and to more easily cope with the break-down of the telephones and the replacement of the telephones.